Counterpoint
by Lifeasanamazon
Summary: We do this, CJ and we do it well. CJT


Author: Angie

Email: AngieSuth@aol.com or angiesuth@hotmail.com 

Title: Counterpoint

Characters: CJ/T

Rating: PG-13

Summary: We do this, CJ and we do it well. 

Disclaimer: Not mine at all. 

Spoilers: All through to Season 5 and then a little AU

Feedback: Always appreciated.

A/N: There are so many who encourage me and there are still yet a handful more who enthuse and inspire. I couldn't do it without you. Or Rhonda. Thank you.

*

Counterpoint 

*

"Thank you for letting me know." Toby flips shut the phone and waits for his eyes to adjust to the bleak winter dawn sneaking through the bare window. A snap, it's open again and the neon makes him blink as he hits the speed dial for Leo.

"It's me. Yeah. It's happened. I'll be in touch."

The glare fades from his face and he rubs a hand slowly through his beard before grinding its heel into each eye. The pain temporarily diverts him from the dread settling in the pit of his stomach.

*

The car smells of her perfume and he flicks at a stray tear as it pools in the corner of his eye, watching the droplet smear his fingernail as the rain punishes the windscreen.

*

"Take me home, Toby. I'm tired and I'm drunk and I'm going to hurt Josh in a minute. Lead me to your car and fold me into the seat and let me snore all the way home."

He takes her hand and pulls her through the lobby, smiling grimly at her pathetic attempts to pull the wrap around her shoulders. He ends up taking it from her and wrapping his arm around her bare skin instead. It is a comfortable move and an old one. It soaks up the pressure and leaves affection in its place.

She snores and he smiles.

He pushes her in through the door and towards her bedroom. She sees the angry blinking from her telephone and gestures lamely towards it.

"I'll deal with it. Take off your makeup. You don't want to scare yourself in the morning." He gives her an extra shove and grunts his amusement as she tips off her heels and falls gracelessly onto the bed.

"Too tired. Will shower with my eyes closed tomorrow." Her voice is muffled by the pillow and her nose and mouth are squashed sideways . He knows that she is seconds away from drooling and that she doesn't care. She pats him aimlessly on the leg and lets her hand drop to the comforter.

Toby wonders briefly whether to try and undress her and lets his eyes stray along her length. He never managed it before without her laughing or punching him, so he decides to quit while he's ahead and deal with her messages.

One . . . two . . . He sighs and presses play.

"Ms Cregg, please ring . . . deteriorated . . . may hang on for a few more days . . . as soon as you can . . . I have left two messages . . . cell phone is unavailable . . ."

Toby dials the number he has written on the pad next to the phone and waits to be connected.

"Yes, my name is Toby Ziegler, I . . . I am ringing for CJ Cregg, Tal Cregg's daughter. Yeah . . . I am . . ." He doesn't flinch at the lie. Some things are necessary. "I'm sorry for the delay in getting back to you . . . "

He hangs up and they have his number. He's not sure that CJ would even hear the phone. The wine and the exhaustion have done for her. He wants her to sleep while she can, dream while she can. He can take up the slack - she deserves it just once in her life. Leo is warned and contingency plans made. They all love CJ nearly as much as she loves them.

He covers her with a blanket and leaves her a note.

He goes home to sleep. While he can.

*

The car smells of her perfume and his chest hurts.

*

Toby takes the steps two at a time and wipes the rain from his head. His key fits easily into the lock and he pauses on the threshold, uncertain of his reception. She's never had a father die before. 

A deep breath takes him into the darkness and he fumbles towards her room, cursing once again her need to sleep in total darkness. He knows she knows he's here; the air has a certain expectancy. He draws a curtain and the gray morning makes its presence felt.

"CJ?"

He sees her on her bed, face pointing towards the door, eyes mascara-smudged and red-rimmed. Not from crying - he sees no tear tracks - but from sleeping through contacts.

"You've got news I'm not gonna like." Her question isn't, and he hears the desperation through the gravel of her waking words.

"CJ, I'm sorry . . ." and his voice breaks.

He sees her struggle to sit, to put on her game face, and it occurs that he hasn't been specific enough. She probably thinks that one of them has fucked up; that she has to pick up the pieces. Even with her scary face and bed hair, she's ready to fight for them.

"It's your dad, CJ. . . " This time it hits home and the breath leaves her body as if he'd hit her in the solar plexus.

He watches her lay back down, sees her feet cross tidily at the ankles, hands rigidly by her side. Staring up at the ceiling. And he shakes away the thought that Tal Cregg is probably lying exactly the same way. But colder.

The silence hangs, but not uncomfortably. They've been down this road before, these two friends, these two never-quite lovers. They know what to do, he knows what to do, so he walks to the bed and lays next to her. Takes her rigid hand in his and strokes gently with writer's fingers; feels her grip back and moves his other hand to her head, tangling the wayward hair with a subtle rhythm. The rhythm of one who plays words in his head, but has none for now.

He kisses her temple and he waits.

**

__

* A Rip In The Fabric *

The car pulls viciously away from the lights and for once the roar of the engine beats the roar in his head.

"Fuck."

He looks at her, eyebrows raised. Tears are streaming unrestrained and uninhibitedly down her face and if the police were to pull them over now, the campaign might find itself minus two of its leading players.

"Where are you taking me?" He is grateful for the strength in his voice and the upper hand. " I think there has been enough sorrow in my family for one day, don't you? I'd rather get there in one piece . . . wherever _there_ is. "

She hits the brakes hard, and, tyres screaming, pulls into the deserted car park. 

"Bastard." She is crying hard now, hands over her face and shoulders shaking. Like a child.

Like the child he's not going to have.

He stares out of the window. Cars are slowly filling the vast lot; employees, drifting through the early gloom towards their daily bread. He has nothing to say, so he doesn't.

"I'm sorry." The sobs are contained. "You didn't deserve that. You didn't deserve any of it. I'm sorry, Toby. For you and for Andi and for the . . . baby. Sorry."

He feels her hand on his leg and all he wants to do is put his head on her shoulder and rail against the world. But he doesn't. He lets his fingers rest on the nape of her neck and draw warmth from the softness he finds there, and he looks out of the misting glass at the people hurrying into the mall, and tries not to wonder about miscarriage statistics.

Protected by the fog, he allows himself to see her. No more tears, just a determined set of the mouth and in her eyes, breath-taking compassion. He truly believes that the mainstay of their friendship over the years has been their unsentimental understanding of each other. She never offers him false hope, she reflects honesty. She takes him as he is.

"Will you try again?" She doesn't sweeten the pill. He respects that, hates it sometimes, but respects it anyway.

A sigh and he watches his breath swirl against the glass.

"I don't know. I have to let her sleep, let her absorb it and try to be sensitive."

"You're not good at that."

"I'm not."

"What about you?" She turns to face him and her hand slides from his leg and he feels her fingers in his, pulling his hand down from her neck into her lap and the comforting clasp of her other hand. She surrounds him.

"I'm not good at that either." He manages a wry smile.

"You're not. But you need to be." She chuckles in return. "I can't look out for you all the time, Toby. I have too much on my plate."

"I'll be fine." And he almost believes it. "We'll be fine."

"You will be."

He doesn't correct her. He doesn't always mean Andi. A whisper of guilt pulls his mind back to the present.

"We have to go to work."

She doesn't let go of his hand, just rubs gently. "In a minute. Don't tell me you're itching to face the crowds?"

"I'm not. But it's work, CJ, I'm a man on a mission."

She squeezes his hand and looks down. "You want me to tell them?"

"Yeah." And he drags her hand to his mouth, resting dry lips on knuckles. He can't look her in the eye. He's nearer tears than he's been for hours. "Thank you."

The engine sparks to life and they sit in silence while their vision clears.

**

__

* An Old Dog And An Old Trick *

"You're gonna use a cue this time." 

She looks at him, no flicker of a smile.

"Take it."

The room is deserted and almost dark. A single spot leaks enough light to illuminate the table, but not much more. There is an air of desolation. They could be the last ones left alive.

Still, she doesn't move, so he walks round the table, brushing the edge with his hip and takes her hand in his, uncurls the stiff fingers and puts the cool wood in her palm. His warm hand covers hers and he looks her in the eye.

"I don't want to play, Toby." CJ feels her heart hammer in her chest. She's not said 'no' to him before and meant it quite so much. She has no idea how he will react.

She sees him tilt his head and catches the glint from beneath the brows. He smells of Jack Daniels and cigar smoke and for the first time ever, it makes her sick. She takes the cue.

"Fine. But don't expect me to be any good." She turns away. Anything to create some space and earn her breathing time. Forget thinking; she's done with thinking.

His voice catches her unawares. "You're good at everything you do, Claudia Jean."

She snorts and her throat hurts. "Oh yeah." Her eyes close and the corners of her mouth turn down in a grimace. She bites down on her cheek, sure that she's given enough of her soul away already to this man and not sure how much there remains to give.

"Play." He is insistent and she can't resist.

"Show me."

She feels him move behind her and his hand between her shoulder blades, pressing firmly until she is bent over the baize. An arm, shirt sleeves rolled around the elbow, winds under hers and pulls the cue parallel to the ground. She feels him warm against her back and a tear leaves a dark green spot. She fixes on it and moves more firmly against him. For her, it's all about comfort.

"You should have talked to me before Leo." His words rumble in her ear and she jerks her head away. He pulls her close again.

"CJ?"

She's tight-lipped.

"You talk to me. That's what we do."

She spins to face him, still locked in the bizarre embrace. She can't believe him, can't believe the half-truth he seems so sure of.

She shouts. "We talk? When was the last time we talked, Toby?" She breaks free and waves the cue above her head. "That would be the time our President told you about his MS, would it?"

He flinches and ducks. There have been several near misses over the years and this is the closest call yet.

"Put it down, CJ, you're gonna hurt yourself." 

The end is suddenly under his nose.

"The only person getting hurt round here is you." She stops and touches the wood to his chest, marking a line from throat to navel. "One of us has been wounded once too often."

She places the cue on the green and leans both fists against its velvet. "I've had enough, Toby."

She feels him before she sees him, smells him before he speaks. Fingers grip her shoulders, run softly down her arms; slide round her waist and then his head is at her neck and it is all warmth and wet and salt. She leans back into him, turns her face to feel his kiss.

"We don't do this, Toby." Her voice is thick with something unidentifiable even to her.

He kisses her again, below the ear. "No, we don't do this, CJ." He turns her to face him. " But we do do * this . . .*" An arm thrown out and she follows its arc, takes in the remnants of the evening; the hope and the fight. "We do this, CJ and we do it well. You do it better than you've ever done anything. You still do."

She looks at him, eyes wide in panic.

"Talk to him if you must." He picks up the cue and lays it on the table, moves each ball into position with painstaking care. "But he needs you." 

He takes her hand and leads her to the door.

"We need you."

**

__

* Forcing The Issue *

"I understand you're off to Atlantic City?"

He looks up from his pad and glares in the direction of the voice. He had it then , he's sure he had it, and now, now it's floating out of the open door. Damn. He glares back down at the insufficient evidence.

"You can't ignore me, Toby. You know I won't be ignored." He watches her settle into his guest chair, wriggling her hips and smoothing her skirt. He knows she's pondering the feet on the desk move, and knows that it might be just a little too revealing in that particular ensemble. She's come to distract him, but not in that way. Not unless the other ways don't work.

"CJ . . ." His tone shows irritation and he truly feels it. The young guy with him earlier, Bill . . . something, he mentally shakes himself, that friend of Sam's, well, he knows what it's like to write, and he knows what it's like to . . . not. CJ, on the other hand, may be Yin to his Yang, but no writer, she.

"Oh, come on, Toby. Aren't you going to take me with you?" 

He doesn't move, so she swings long legs up and round, heels landing smartly on his third paragraph, dignity in tact by a quarter inch. "I could show you my tricks?"

He has to smile and sees her glee. "I've seen all your tricks, CJ, and those I may have missed I'll probably read about in the Washington Post." 

A flicker of irritation across her lovely face, and he curses his clumsiness. He can't seem to do anything right these days. He places a finger on her ankle in apology.

She accepts.

"How do you know that I don't have a few new ones up my sleeve, Tobus? I'll make it worth your while." She raises an eyebrow. "You want to find out?"

"Stop flirting with me, CJ, it's not working." He sits back heavily in the chair and the temporary lift in his mood is over.

"I know." She sighs and removes her legs, flashing a good deal more flesh than she intended, when it had seemed like a good idea.

Toby sees and smiles again. He loves this about her; the juxtaposition of elegance and ineptitude that is uniquely CJ. His CJ, though. The world just sees the elegance, the other is well disguised.

"Why would I take you to Atlantic City, even if I were ever to consider something so out of character?" The muse has gone and he decides he needs the distraction after all.

She smirks at her easy victory. "Because I'm your fun friend, Toby. I'm your only friend. Or even if you root around real hard and come up with another name, I'm the only friend that could put up with you for more than a couple of hours. I have the patience of a saint and a winning personality. I also happen to be fairly decorative and you would get admiring glances from all the other middle-aged men who have gone to Atlantic City to escape from their real and frustrating lives."

He is openly smiling now, can't help himself. "But aren't you just a bitter reminder of the frustration of my real life, CJ? Decorative, or otherwise?"

"I am. But you'd be bored by yourself and you'd get introspective and then you'd be back to feeling like hell. And, of course, you'd miss me if I wasn't there."

"We're not talking a lifetime move here, CJ. We, or more specifically you, are talking about a hypothetical weekend away to a place I have no desire to see, with or without a decorative companion." He picks up his pen and touches the end to his lip, grimacing at the hopelessness of the gesture. "How do you know about my travel plans anyway?"

"That's for me to know and for you not to . . . you know." She sighed. "Okay, maybe I smelt burning paper and maybe I wanted to investigate and maybe I just happened to overhear a conversation . . .anyway . . . Toby, I know you can't write."

He sticks his bottom lip out and stares at the desk.

"I know you can't write and I know it's making you mad and . . .I just wanted to help." She stands and walks to lay full length on his couch, ankles crossed over the arm. She won't look at him and he knows she is embarrassed by having to say the words.

He decides to let her off the hook, not make her put words to the robust fragility of their friendship. They don't talk about helping, God help them for admitting the need for it. They just do. Help each other. However they can.

He throws her a pen. The paper she can reach herself. 

"Okay, let's start with a little exercise . . . imagine you are writing a bitter middle-aged man's guide to finding a vacation companion. What is your opening line?" she asks.

She looks up to see him perched on the edge of his desk, smiling softly.

"Well, I think I can come up with something better than, "I could show you my tricks"." He almost sounds indignant.

"See!" She is laughing a full-throated gurgle that makes his heart leap. "You haven't lost your touch, Toby!"

"It's not quite what I had in mind for Inauguration though." He clamps his hands to the edge of the desk and rocks back on his heels, but the despair has lifted. He's looking for it, he can see it, only it's not quite as thick as before.

She stands, hands on hips. "I don't know, I can think of worse ways to open. Especially if you want to show someone you care."

He nods and sees her slight smile, then watches her back as she leaves.

**

__

* The World Can Be Any Way Up *

The quiet of the parking lot is like the center of the storm. 

"We always seem to be in your car when Andi is in the hospital."

CJ glances at him, catches the desperate worry mixed with guilty joy and leans in to kiss his cheek. It is the least she can do. "I know."

The silence continues. They're not going anywhere.

"How are you feeling now?" She thinks it's a stupid question, but exhaustion lays her low and she just hopes he'll let it slide.

"Honestly?" He gives her a stupid answer, except it's not. No time for games - they're all played out.

"Yeah."

"It's the best day of my life."

"I'm happy for you, Toby." She takes his hand and squeezes it, uses the other to calm a rogue hair in his eyebrow and sees the elation in his eyes. "It's what you've always wanted."

He grunts. "It's one of the things I've always wanted. I'm a greedy man, CJ. I want it all."

So does she, and the pain of not having it squeezes the air out of her lungs almost to panic point.

She gasps out, "The President thought he had it all. Now what is he left with?" She can't breathe in fast enough, her whole body starts to shake with the effort to stay in control. She grasps at him, desperate for him to save her, "Sorry, sorry, sorry . . ." The words run together until he forces them back with his mouth on hers.

"It's fine, I'm here, it's fine." He pulls back from the kiss, appalled by his instinctive reaction, taking her face in both his hands and running his thumbs over her cheeks. Over and over. "They'll find her and he'll be back . . . it's okay."

She rests her head on his chest and allows his thundering heartbeat to calm her; to suppress the instinct to vomit. She's not sure she'd be able to explain that away.

He's talking quietly now, whispering into her hair, his hands still on her face, cradling. "He had to leave, CJ, he had to. He couldn't be the one who killed her; the one who made the wrong decision - a father's decision, not a President's. The right decision. It would be mine now."

Somehow, she rights herself and shakes him off. She grabs his dropping hands, pulling them to her chest, her face just inches from his, eyes huge. "But what about Zoey, Toby? How is she feeling? Apart from the fear, I mean. I know she must be scared, out of her mind maybe, plus the pain, the physical pain. But . . . I can't put it into words . . . she loves her father, her parents, she knows how they are going to be hurting, she knows his dilemma. She's a bright girl, Toby, and she's young and she's the daughter of the President of the United States. It goes both ways . . . love goes both ways . . ."

They cling to each other.

It goes both ways.

**

The car smells of her perfume and death.

He wonders about that. They spent forty-eight hours in Dayton and the hearse took the coffin. Still, his car smells of death.

And her perfume.

And she's sitting beside him as they pull into his parking space.

"I'm nervous, Toby. Suppose I cry?"

"Why would you cry?" He is amused by the idea.

"I cry when people are nice to me."

"Then it's just as well I never am." He ducks her hand and suppresses a laugh. This is what she needs, what they need. He knows that Donna will have Josh under strict supervision, in the same way he knows that CJ will need to be comforted by Josh, that he is the right man for this. The timing just has to be right.

The others will have to take care of themselves.

Time to go in, and as they walk through the lobby, he can feel her pressed close beside him.

"CJ!" A voice across the hall. They both turn and Toby bites his tongue.

"I'm so sorry about your father." An arm shoots out and a hand lands gently on her arm.

CJ looks round and smiles. "Thanks, Ed. Thank you for saying so."

Ed moves off with a smile.

Toby finds her elbow briefly and squeezes.

*

He looks at his watch and the pile of files on his desk. He could be here for hours.

"Toby?" She's leaning against his door, pale but still standing. "Do you want to come home with me and not have pancakes?"

He grins, this is typical CJ, he thinks. "Is that some kind of code? "

"No. I bought a new stove - it arrived last week." 

It's the first he's heard of it, but then, why would he know? He shrugs. "And why have you not been making pancakes on your new and almost pointless stove?"

She smiles, but she's not giving in. "If there were pancakes to be made in my family, it was my dad who made them. At some point I'm gonna have to learn."

He gets up and crosses to her, watching as she places a warm hand on his tie. "CJ, I have watched you consume many, many things, but I have never seen you eat a pancake." He is confused by the turn of the conversation, but content to indulge her, happy to see the spark. Happy, on this occasion, to be the victim of what he is sure will turn out to be a joke at his expense.

"I've never been fond of them, but someone has to, you know, take up the mantel." Now she looks demure, and he struggles not to laugh outright.

He looks at her for a long moment. "And that would be you? Forty three years of abstinence, and suddenly, pancakes are an imperative? A family heirloom to be handed down through the ages? The Cregg family jewels?" He flinches slightly at the knowledge that the tradition stops with her.

"I may not have been keen, but my dad's pancakes were to die for." She grimaces and then laughs. "Apparently."

She runs her finger down his necktie and focuses her eyes on the knot . "Does Andi make pancakes for the kids?"

"Yeah." He doesn't take his eyes off her face.

"Oh, okay."

A slight hitch in her breath and he can't say it fast enough, "They wouldn't be the same as yours though."

He looks up at her, sees the storm clouds clear and then the sun come out.

"There's no one perfect way to make a pancake, is there?" There's hope in her voice at last.

He says nothing, walks round her desk and tugs her by the elbow until he has her in a tight hug. Briefly.

"There's not."

No joke, he thinks, not for them. It's a fine balance, staying in tune and holding on to hope.

The End


End file.
